Far as we can tell, those rascals in Congress are hitting about .500 on their recent trip to the batting cage.
They swung weakly and missed last week when investigating The Phony, Rafael Palmeiro, for perjury.
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| Jason Giambi still piques suspicion with his second-half numbers. (Getty Images) |
Ah, yes. Patriotism, 18th century English writer Samuel Johnson memorably said, is the last refuge of a scoundrel.
And in these days of obscene profits for oil companies, botched hurricane recovery efforts and a seemingly endless war in Iraq, what could be viewed as more patriotic than saving that most American of sports, baseball?
So faced with a hard-charging Congress that had fast-tracked this steroids thing and was closing in on legislation, the players' union finally met commissioner Bud Selig somewhere near his home in Milwaukee and relented.
Make no mistake: This was not a meet-you-halfway kind of thing.
The victory is clear for Selig, whose proposal was accepted almost entirely by the union -- a 50-game suspension for a first-time steroid offense, a 100-gamer for a second offense, and a lifetime ban for a third offense. Also, there will be suspensions for those caught with amphetamines.
Would the new policy have been more easily digested -- and protected the game from all kinds of collateral damage -- had it happened a decade ago?
Absolutely.
Would it have meant more had the players and owners worked it out themselves before being backed into a corner by the politicians?
You bet.
But, deep breath here, we've learned over the years that, when it comes to baseball conducting its own business, even changing the smallest thing becomes a laborious, drawn-out process requiring patience, coffee and lie-detector tests.
